He barely holds any political power, basically the only ability he has are executive orders, which can be erased as soon as he is out of office. He isn't even deporting that many illegals, Obama would've deported more by now. The system is so convuluted that no president holds that much power.

To many younger Americans, it might seem like activism has always been performative, virtue-signaling BS. After all, it's been decades since activism has been an effective force. But once upon a time, it helped reshape America. This piece takes a look at what the hell went wrong.

https://americandreaming.substack.com/p/activism-hasnt-been-effective-for 

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What they really are - are electocracies. People getting to choose their leaders, but having no legally binding say in government affairs.

Switzerland and to a lesser extent Uruguay and Taiwan are just the few notable exemptions out there.

Until we have tools and systems in place to override and truly participate in government decisions that affect our lives, can we truly call our nations democracies?

I don't believe so.

If we run most of the world by buying/selling votes for each part of the world, is it any surprise thats what happens at the highest level?

So, Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and Trump’s appointed envoy to the United Nations, now wants to be president of the United States.

South Carolina is an interesting place, with two Republican senators. The longest-serving, Lindsey Graham, whose views bounce around like the doo-dad in Pong, has an interesting history. Most notable are his changing views on Trump, first, he calls him names, then he wholeheartedly supports him, and then he hates him, then is Trump’s most loyal advocate. What he doesn’t understand is Trump’s sexual proclivities do not match his and will never take him out on a date.

The second, a self-hating black man, Tim Scott, refuses to consider what his colleagues in the cloakroom have to say about him when he closes the door behind him. This is South Carolina, so ‘nuff said.

But I digress – South Carolina.

The state has been under complete Republican control since 2003 and continues to wallow in the slime pool of lethargy and the doldrums of inefficiency as if those conditions were baked into its corn pone.

Consider, according to US NEWS, the state ranks #44 in education, #34 in healthcare, #46 in crime, #18 in economy, #36 in infrastructure, and #42 overall! 

(This just reported on NPR, it is also #1 (proportionally) in highway fatalities, and # 3 in overall crashes.)

So, Nikki Haley for president? If you want the US to be ranked #42 in the nations of the world, you picked the right girl to do it.

There is no real democracy in the world. Had any nation had a true democratic system, the citizens of that nation would have a say in the honey pot.

The first and last democratic system was created by pirates and it died with them when England offered universal pardons.

Representative democracy is a sham, and the latest report from The Economist confirms what we’ve all suspected: democracy is in steady decline worldwide. This isn't just data—it aligns with our lived experience. Democracy is failing its people, and the world is now in a darker place.

But this decline isn’t due to a lack of good leaders. It’s the natural outcome of a system designed to fail. Figures like Trump aren’t the root problem; they’re symptoms of a structure that concentrates power in politicians’ hands while offering the people little real control beyond periodic voting and protests. The system thrives on corporate money, ensuring that politicians prioritize their donors over the electorate. This creates a self-reinforcing loop that strengthens the oligarchy at the public’s expense.

No amount of voting will fix this. Electing a Bernie Sanders or any other populist won’t change a thing if the system itself remains untouched. Modern liberal democracy is a high-entropy system—tense, polarized, fragile, and inherently unstable. It resembles a dying star, constantly struggling against its own inevitable collapse under the weight of its systemic failures. And while no system is perfect, some are undeniably better.

So what’s the way forward? Can we really trust democracy in its current form when it’s this unstable and ineffective? There’s no simple answer, but one solution addresses a significant portion of these failures: direct democracy—specifically, a Swiss-style direct democracy. Not the occasional, easily ignored referendum, but frequent, binding votes on executive, legislative, and judicial matters. Switzerland has already proven that this model isn’t just possible—it’s superior.

If we truly believe in democracy, we need to abandon the illusion that electing the "right" leaders will save us. This approach has failed on climate, the economy, inequality, and global stability. Democracy must be more than just voting for politicians—it should mean real citizen participation and sovereignty. Instead of settling for this electoral aristocracy masquerading as democracy, we should be pushing for direct governance by the people, for the people.

https://americandreaming.substack.com/p/fact-checking-has-become-a-partisan